


True

by Ivillpunchyouinthethroat



Category: The King (2019)
Genre: John does a lot of observing, M/M, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2021-02-18 01:14:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21519499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ivillpunchyouinthethroat/pseuds/Ivillpunchyouinthethroat
Summary: It’d been something about the cold stillness of the air that had prompted John to speak.“I am a drunken, old soldier Hal,” he whispered, not wanting to break the silent reverence of the morning, “why do you come back to me?”Hal hadn’t hesitated.“You are true,” he said, fingers light and soft on John’s chest, “you speak what is true, always."Moments of recollection before battle.
Relationships: Sir John Falstaff/Prince Hal (Shakespeare)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 97





	True

**Author's Note:**

> This ship had me at "You be the one that's been forgot" and then backhanded me with "Win my friend"

John remembers the first time Hal invited himself to his bed.

“Hal, _no._ ” John said, no matter that he’d seen the fire in Hal’s eyes the minute the young prince had stepped in his room, no matter that John had tasted that same fire on Hal’s lips already.

“You want this,” Hal said, the stink of liquor hot on his breath, his already dark eyes shadowed darker and all the more beautiful up close for it.

But then again, Hal had always been beautiful.

The prince pressed closer, flush to John as he pinned him against the wall of the cheap room the ex-soldier called home for the week. The hard heat between the prince’s legs pressed into John’s thigh and John could not help but press his own hardness into Hal in turn.

Hal moaned, something soft and secretive, as if he only meant it for John’s ears.

“You want this as much as I do,” he said, lunging up to capture John’s lips once more. 

And John did, he could not deny it. That did not mean he would not try.

He reached up, grabbed hold of Hal’s shoulders, pushed him and his stifling heat away.

“You are a prince Hal, you are a _man—”_

“I am the disavowed drunkard son of a mad tyrant,” Hal was quick to retort, the same venom in his tone whenever he spoke of his father dripping from his words. “My father thinks me weak and effeminate already for not blindly following his vision of war and strife, I do not think sodomy will add much onto my sins.”

“Hal, you are next in line—”

“I do not wish to be king, nor has my father any regard to make me one. Thomas has always been the son for that.”

“It is _wrong—_ ”

“Killing is wrong,” Hal said, something dangerous glinting in his eyes, “yet my father does it again and again and the church condones each and every one of his senseless battles. I do not take much stock in what the church tells me is _wrong._ ”

He surged in close again, dug his hands in tight in John’s short hair.

“Now tell me John,” the prince said, words whispered against John’s lips. “Do you want this? Do you want _me_?”

“Yes,” John moaned, like a confession, like a surrender, “ _yes.”_

***

John had never given much thought to laying with a man but Hal had come, unsurprisingly, well prepared.

He was a prince after all, he was used to getting what he wanted.

It’d taken them a few moments and some awkward fumbling but soon Hal was straddling him. He lifted up, lining John up with his entrance and then he was finally sinking down on John’s cock, eyes fluttering shut in pleasure at the slide, made easy and slick by the oil Hal had brought with him.

“John…” Hal moaned out as he bottomed, back a taught arch as John sheathed himself fully in the scorching warmth of his body.

“Hal—” John choked, fingers dug in at the prince’ waist, clawed with the urge to _move—_ but Hal was not a woman, and this could be painful if they did not do it right and he did not want to hurt—

Hal’s eyes opened, blown dark and wide in lust, he lifted himself up off of John, then sank back down, _hard._

“Fuck me, John” Hal commanded, with that same imperious tone he’d used when he was still in his father’s court.

It was a prince’s tone. It was meant to be obeyed _._

And John could not disobey his prince’s orders, now could he.

***

Their couplings were many and often after that. Hal was young and as starved as any young man was for the pleasures of the flesh.

John did his best to satisfy Hal’s hunger yet the prince still took woman to his bed sometimes.

But John never begrudged him that. Hal was young and John was a tired old soldier, hardly enough to keep the sole attention of somebody as beautiful as his prince.

Besides, Hal might take many strangers to his bed, but John was the only one he ever came back to.

Somehow, that meant something.

***

It was one frozen winter morning that John asked why.

Dawn had barely broken over England as they laid in another cheap bed, heavy breathing barely evened out from their passions prior. Hal was sprawled halfway on his chest, one hand sifting softly through the spattering of hair there.

It’d been something about the cold stillness of the air that had prompted John to speak.

“I am a drunken, old soldier Hal,” he whispered, not wanting to break the silent reverence of the morning, “why do you come back to me?”

Hal hadn’t hesitated.

“You are true,” he said, fingers light and soft on John’s chest, “you speak what is true, always, and you do not care that I am prince.”

John chuckled, “For a prince, you are easily impressed then.”

Hal grinned up at him, devious and playful.

“Easily impressed, am I?” he said, one eyebrow raised.

He stole one last kiss from John’s lips and then scurried down and _down,_ until he was poised between John’s legs.

“We’ll see who is easily impressed,” he purred at John before his mouth became otherwise occupied.

***

It had hurt much more than John was willing to admit when the old hag at the bar had told him he’d been forgotten.

Much much more.

He’d always known he was nothing more than a passing dalliance, a curious urge to satisfy for a spoiled prince who, as much as he decried his wealth and privilege, had always gotten what he wanted anyways.

_You be the one that’s been forgot_

It still hurt.

 _You are true,_ Hal had told him and he’d always had a way with words, cold and clipped as they often were. John had let himself believe them.

Stupid old fool he was.

***

John was much more relieved than he should have been when Hal asked him to ride to war with him.

“I need men around me I can trust. I’m here because you are my friend.” Hal leaned in closer then so that his man at the door could not hear what he said, as if his words were for John’s ears only, “I need someone who speaks true.”

“A king has no friends. A king has only followers and foe.” John spoke even as Hal’s words cocooned themselves in John’s chest and radiated warmth, that same warmth that John had tasted on Hal’s lips hundreds and hundreds of times.

But he couldn’t give in, not yet.

He needed to see what Hal would do. If Hal did still think of him as somebody who spoke true, if he still valued him as someone who did not care that he was a prince and would not care that he was now king.

No, John would not give Hal what he wanted only because he asked for it.

At least not in this.

“I’m sorry my occasion to visit,” Hal finally spoke as he rose from his chair, “carries with it this doleful weight.” Hal glanced at him one last time before turning and there was something that looked surprisingly like hurt in his eyes.

It was the reassurance that John needed.

“Hal,” he said, did not miss the way that Hal almost tripped over himself in his haste to look back.

“I will come with you. I ask only one favour in return.”

Hal stayed frozen in place, immobile in John’s silence.

“Square my account with that terrible hag over there would you?”

Hal smiled, it was faint but it was there, and John would take it.

***

Hal introduced him to his court, it went about as well as it could have.

The men had given John measuring looks, no doubt taking in the softness of his belly, the redness of his face after years and years of drink and not even Hal’s glowing words of praise had done much to wipe the disdain from some of their features.

“Sir John, with me,” Hal said as he dismissed the rest of his lords. They inclined their heads and filed out of the room but not before giving John some last lingering looks.

Hal turned towards his room, shoulders set and stiff in a way that John had never used to see them.

Even the way Hal walked now was different. Was regal.

Hal was not Hal anymore, the drunkard wayward prince that John had come to know.

Hal’s attendant was the only other man who had not left with the lords and he made to follow them but Hal dismissed him with a curt shake of the head.

“Sir John and I have matters of war to discuss,” Hal said, tone as commanding as his figure, “the utmost privacy is needed. I expect no one to disturb our council not even if the rapture itself were to occur. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, your majesty,” the attendant bowed as he left, closing the doors of the waiting room.

They headed to Hal’s room unaccompanied.

“Shut the doors John,” Hal said once they’d stepped into his room and it was only when the heavy doors closed and locked that Hal finally sagged.

His shoulders relaxed, his back bowed and when he turned he wore that same small smile he had given John back at Eastcheap.

He was Hal once more, John’s Hal.

“I…” Hal started, seemed to hesitate, “I do not get much privacy nowadays, but if they think that we are discussing the war they will hold off for at least a few hours.”

There was an invitation in Hal’s words, but there was also an uncharacteristic shyness in the prince as he looked up at John, head bowed and eyes liquid through his lashes. It was strange, seeing this timidness in the man had never been afraid of demanding what he wanted before.

It was almost as if Hal thought John would refuse him.

John chuckled, if he’d been unable to refuse him the first time Hal had barreled his way into his life and his bed there was certainly no hope for him now.

So John smiled, wide and crooked.

“I take it then, that you did not call me to your room to discuss important war matters, now did you Hal.”

Hal grinned in response, relief in his features as he sauntered up to John and threw arms around his neck.

“I can assure you, _this_ is of the utmost importance,” he said before he captured John’s lips in a kiss.

***

John had never fucked in a royal bed before.

This was not a room at Eastcheap, where the quilts were so bare you could see through them and the mattress so thin you might as well have been fucking on nothing but the wooden frame. No, Hal’s room was extravagance personified, mattress so soft John was sank halfway into it where he kneeled, the frame of it so new that it barely made a noise as they moved.

But if anything, John was now grateful for the excess of it all, for he was sure that if the pillows that Hal screamed into as John fucked into him with abandon were not as plush and fat with down as they were, the whole castle would have echoed with Hal’s screams.

***

They set sail soon after that. The preparations for war had been mostly set even before John had joined the campaign.

Hal spent a lot of the trip sat gazing out into the sea. John wondered if Hal pondered what his life would have been had his brother lived. If he’d never had to assume the crown.

Would he still be John’s Hal? Banished royalty that was too easy with his liquor and too loose with his money. Would he have spent the rest of his days in different taverns and brothels, the only common room to any of his life being John’s?

What would have become of him?

Of…them?

But John shook the thoughts away.

It was no use in thinking of what could have been, what could be.

Their reality was set already, waiting for them at landfall.

***

The days dragged on, first the siege and now their slow march towards The Dauphin and John ached with the need to _touch_.

Everyday he rode and walked next to Hal yet the distance between them had never felt so large.

Hal had always been generous with his touch, even back before he’d found himself in John’s bed. There’d always been a hand at John’s shoulder or at his arm, the light weight of him pressed to John’s side when he’d have to drag the drunk prince out of Eastcheap; and eventually, John had grown used to the deep warmth of Hal ‘s body next to him as he slept.

But Hal was nothing but a King in this campaign, shoulders set stiffly and gait just as stout. He could not afford to be seen as anything less by his men.

Hal was aloof and cold, sometimes even cruel and it made John _ache._

***

They shared one brief kiss in Hal’s tent in a rare moment of privacy.

They were also almost caught.

Hal’s attendant had come in only moments later, a messy sheaf of papers in hand ready for the king’s inspection.

It had clicked then, as they’d sprung apart in haste—the attendant too busy shuffling his papers to even notice their hurried movements—

There really was no room for John in Hal’s life anymore. There could not be.

They’d snatched moments in the secrecy of Hal’s room back in England but even those had been harried and frantic.

The time Hal had spent in this war campaign, always observed, never alone, that was to be his _life_ now.

Hal was King.

He had a title to uphold, a crown to keep secure.

And John, even if it cost him life, would make sure he kept it.

***

“I will fight with you.”

And John could not keep looking at him because Hal, the sentimental fool, meant it.

If John asked it of him Hal would die by his side.

“It’s noble—but you know that cannot be.” John turned to him, “I die here or…” He looked down, fought the urge to throw his arms around Hal, kiss his words into skin, taste the fire of his lips one last time “…I die over a bottle at Eastcheap. And I think this makes for a much better story.”

He smiled, he had always known, even before, that he would never be enough for Hal.

For a prince.

For a King.

“And you have things still to do.”

A kingdom to build, and John knew he would.

John grabbed the nape of Hal’s neck and pulled, shifted his hand at the last second to cup his cheek instead. He leaned in close, close enough to feel the warmth of Hal’s breath. It was not the fire of his lips, but it would do, it was the only thing he would allow himself with all of England’s army as a witness.

“Win my friend.

“Maybe then you’ll lighten enough to have a drink with me.”

Hal said nothing, but he didn’t have to, John knew his prince well enough to see the sorrow in his eyes.

***

“For the King and St. George!”

John was going to die in this battle.

He knew it, felt it in his bones as he raised his sword and gave the order to advance.

He was going to die but John felt strangely at peace with it.

Hal was King now.

There was no room for a tired ex-soldier.

He loved him, by god he _loved him._

But _this_ is what he could give him, the only thing worthwhile.

The certainty of his crown.

John lifted his sword and breathed.

***

Hal had lost everything in this war.

This stupid war that need not have been waged.

He’d always thought himself above his father, above the useless squabbling of his court and the greedy ambition of vain old men who had never set foot on a battlefield and never would.

 _A ball?_ The daughter of his enemy had asked him.

He’d thought he’d be a different king. A better king.

He’d staked John’s life on that thought.

John had _died_ for that thought.

He’d died for _sheep._

Hal walks up to this wisp of a woman, the daughter of his enemy, his soon to be bride. Her eyes are as hard as ice as he approaches.

“I ask nothing of you…”

She was not someone Hal could ever come to love, he would not ask for her love in return.

“Only that you will always speak to me clear and true. Always. Will you promise me only that.”

She was not John, no one ever would be.

But John would have liked her, Hal knows, would have respected the hardness of her eyes and the straightness of her spine, the dignity with which she held her chin aloft, even in the home of the man who’d killed her brother.

“I will.” She says, amid the chanting backdrop of Hal’s people, their celebration of hundreds of her people slaughtered.

Hal _would_ be a better king, would make a better England.

She takes his hands.

He owes John’s memory at least that.

**Author's Note:**

> ;-;


End file.
